


I Have Loved the Stars too Fondly

by infernalandmortal



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-26
Updated: 2017-03-26
Packaged: 2018-10-11 02:59:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,610
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10453440
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/infernalandmortal/pseuds/infernalandmortal
Summary: “I won’t let anyone hurt you,” she says, her throat tightening suddenly at the trust he’s placing in her. Touch isn’t easy for either of them. She thinks if she stays still long enough he won’t go anywhere.He takes a deep shuddering breath. “I believe you.” His voice is soft, gentle in its humor.





	

**Author's Note:**

> This started off as a prompt on Tumblr and then snowballed. What else is new. ;)
> 
> Let me know what you think!

Emori loves the stars.

When she was a child she would wait for the sun to set beyond the sand, counting the clouds as they faded into the sunset, watching for her favorite star to peer from the inky sky. In the sleeping hours of the night, when the sky was pitch black and no one but her and the nocturnal critters of the forest was awake, she would slip from her brother’s side and clumsily climb a tree, resting her chin on her hand and waiting for the sunset’s obnoxious colors to disperse.

She hates the color of the day. She prefers the absence of the night.

Now she’s back in the forest, leaning against a cave wall and searching the night sky for the first time in months. Her star is gone, hidden by the trees or the clouds, but she searches for it anyway.

She turns to the mouth of the cave when John stirs in his sleep, letting a fond smile creep across her face. He sleeps with one arm under his head, the other one wraps loosely around his torso. It’s childishly endearing but in a sad way. 

As she watches, he twitches twice and wakes with a strangled shout, breaking the stillness with frantic eyes and heaving breaths. She abandons her post in an instant, kneeling at his side and resting her good hand on his shoulder.

“You’re alright,” she murmurs as he regulates his breathing, keeping his eyes trained on the stone beneath him as if he’s ashamed to look her in the eye. When he lifts his head, his mouth was set in a thin line and, by the light of the moon, she can see the color high in his cheeks.

“What was it?” She asks softly, scooting back against the cave wall. He follows suit and then they’re sitting shoulder-to-shoulder as naturally as if they’ve done it a thousand times.

When she looks at him out of the corner of her eye, she traces the line of his jaw. Her lips tingle as she remembers how she kissed him on the cheek in thanks for saving her life, how he had flinched slightly before relaxing beneath her touch.

“What was it?” She asks again.

He sighs. His long fingers brush over his neck subconsciously. His eyes go far away, scanning over the cave wall, and Emori can see tears welling in his eyes.

“She dies.” His voice cracks but only slightly. If her ears weren’t keen from a lifetime of listening she wouldn’t have known. “And it’s my fault. And then they string me up for something I didn’t do and no one cuts me down.”

“What else?”

He sniffs, tough exterior returning. Emori understands the pain behind the anger. “I was tortured. My nails were pulled out. They beat me and cut me for three days and I didn’t say anything until the end. Even though I hated them.” He scoffed. “I never got a ‘thanks for the loyalty,’ either.”

“You see it? In your dreams, I mean.”

He nods. Her stomach does a funny little twist. She rests her head on his shoulder, bone digging into her temple, the pressure not unpleasant.

“Come here,” she decides after a moment, standing, taking his hand and pulling him to the mouth of the cave. He stands behind her, almost close enough to touch, and she can feel his eyes on her as she looks up.

“Due North,” he says after a while, his voice full of mirth. Emori lets out a laugh that’s half relief, half humor. “I’m lousy at following the stars.”

“You lived in them,” she retorts. “You can’t have been that bad.”

“They look different down here,” he counters. Emori expects to hear longing in his voice but there is none. There is nothing but weariness.

Before she can stop herself, she’s leaning against him, her back against his chest, and his arms are wrapped around her shoulders so quickly it’s almost natural. He’s fragile against her, ribs and wrists and a beating heart still racing from a nightmare.

“I won’t let anyone hurt you,” she says, her throat tightening suddenly at the trust he’s placing in her. Touch isn’t easy for either of them. She thinks if she stays still long enough he won’t go anywhere.

He takes a deep shuddering breath. “I believe you.” His voice is soft, gentle in its humor.

She turns and his arms shift to accommodate her, caging her in around the waist. His eyes are a ghostly shade of blue in the moonlight. She wonders if he can see hers at all.

“I won’t let anyone hurt you,” she whispers again. “I promise.”

His breath washes over her face. “I know,” he murmurs back. “Emori…”

She frowns, afraid she has done something wrong, worried he can feel the unexplainable pounding of her heart. One hand comes up to her cheek, his thumb running over the healing scar on her cheekbone. She fights the urge to close her eyes. 

“You…” He blows out a frustrated breath. She tries not to but her eyes fall to his lips. She wants to touch them but wraps her hands around his jacket instead.

“I what?” She tries for a teasing tone but her voice is too tense to do much good. A warm wind blows in from outside, ruffling her hair, blowing some of it into her eyes.

He brushes it away carefully and his eyes flick to her mouth, so unsubtly that she knew he meant for her to see.

She gives him the sparest of nods. Her heart is in her throat and then his lips are on hers and it’s the softest, sweetest kiss she has ever had.

She feels her eyes close, feels his arms tighten around her, pulling her closer until their torsos are pressed together and _oh_  he’s not pulling away, just tilting his head so he can breathe through his nose and everything from her lips down is warm and she’s the one who breaks the kiss because she’s smiling so wide.

Their breathing comes heavy as he licks his lips and reaches for her bad hand. She lets him, watching in wonder as he removes the wrap and lifts it up, pressing a kiss to each one of the fingers and two to her palm before running the pads of his fingers over the thick scar that bracelets her wrists like a braided rope.

She answers his question before he can ask it.

“I was cast out as an infant. There was a never a time when I didn’t know exactly why we had no home.” She swallows hard. “I was fourteen. My mother was gone. My father left a long time ago.” There is hate in her voice now. She doesn’t bother to hide it. “It was Otan and I and we were all alone. He grieved by throwing himself into his work. He always had a stupid hope that someday we could find a place to belong. I took my hate out on myself.”

“You tried to take it off.”

She meets his eyes again. There is nothing there but understanding. “Yes.”

He runs his fingers over the scar again, reverence crossing his features. She realizes that she has never seen him look anything but hard, not until now. Now his face is open, the bags under his eyes dark and his gaze heavy. Her cheeks burn when he kisses over the inside of her wrist where the scarring is dark and deep.

She surges forward and captures his lips again, suddenly desperate to keep his eyes away from everything about her that is flawed. He comes willingly, teeth nipping at her lower lip accidentally, a huff of breath released in surprised when her back collides with the wall.

“I don’t remember moving,” she laughs breathlessly, breaking apart from him, letting out a tiny sigh when he kisses her cheek, her jaw, the side of her neck. She bends to him, lets him run his lips over her pulse point, squeezes his shoulders in response.

He pulls away, flustered and grinning, and Emori smiles back. The world seems brighter now somehow, though the night is only getting darker.

“You should get some more sleep,” she tells him, her voice raspy. He raises an eyebrow at her until she clears her throat.

He won’t let go of her. “You too. No one’s going to bother us.” Now it’s his turn to cast his eyes downward. “I don’t want to have another nightmare.”

Emori looks out into the night. There’s a clear sky now and a gentle wind. Her star, which usually hovered over Trikru territory as if it taunted her in her inability to cross an invisible line, is still not flashing from the sky.

“Alright,” she relents, letting him take her uncovered hand and pull her to his makeshift bed. There’s an awkward moment of arrainging their limbs before she finds a position she likes: half on her side, her forehead pressed against his shoulder, her arm over his stomach. It’s touch, but not too much, and his warmth is enough to comfort her.

She’s almost asleep when she realizes. “John?”

“Hmm?”

“Could you see your space station from the ground?”

He stirs slightly. “Probably. Why?”

She lets out a small laugh. “You were my star.”

“What?”

“My favorite star…” She laughs again. “I think it was your Ark.”

“There’s almost something poetic about that,” he muses, voice thick with sleep. “If you like that sort of thing.”

 _I like you,_ she thinks instead before drifting off to sleep, impossibly happy and improbably safe.


End file.
